smoke-filled room

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Maybe CFB should go Waymo, blame the robots for any uproar about gatekeeping and big-school elitism and let the smoke-filled room return to cognacs and afternoon naps.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 22, 2025

"We didn't want people fumbling about in the dark, in possibly a smoke-filled room, trying to undo a lock," she said.

From BBC • Oct. 15, 2025

A rural Ohio newspaperman who had risen to U.S. senator, Harding was a reluctant compromise candidate during the 1920 Republican convention in Chicago, emerging from a proverbially smoke-filled room.

From Seattle Times • Jul. 13, 2023

The modern presidential convention is less of a smoke-filled room and more of a trade event, where people mingle, commiserate, and then ratify the results of the primaries in a grand display of unity.

From Slate • Jul. 18, 2016

And I was left standing there alone in the smoke-filled room with nothing but the thunderings of my own pulses to break the silence.

From To-morrow? by Cross, Victoria